Environmental Studies

From Trauma to Transformation and Beyond

October 20, 2022 by University Communications & Marketing

The road Kimmy Takata ’22 took to college wasn’t traditional—or easy.

But while she says much of her life has been defined by struggle, Takata is choosing to focus on everything she’s accomplished and all the people who have helped her along the way. “My journey has been one from trauma to transformation,” she said, on a recent afternoon. “It takes a village to save somebody and it took 10 villages to save me, including the village I found at Chaminade.”

Now the 53-year-old is setting her sights on new goals—from serving as a mentor to other women exiting prison to even going back to school to pursue a graduate degree. She said her story is an example of what’s possible when you work hard, dream big and get plenty of help along the way.

“People believed in me. That’s the key,” she said.

Takata wasn’t always confident in herself.

As a child growing up in an abusive household, she struggled with low self-esteem. She said she was constantly being called “dumb” and “stupid”—and often heard those words in her head when she was at school. Throughout her teens, Takata was in and out of youth lockup and struggled with drugs.

Eventually, she dropped out of school.

“I never even thought of myself going to college,” she said. “College wasn’t even in my vocabulary.”

In the years that followed, things got worse for Takata. And then, she hit rock bottom.

She was arrested and charged with 16 counts and sentenced to 40 years behind bars. Then in 2003, Takata escaped from Oahu Community Correctional Center and was gone for four days. When she was arrested again, she was transferred to a women’s prison and placed in lockdown “for a very long time.”

She thought that all was lost. But it was at that moment things started to turn around.

Takata was given the chance to enroll in classes and earned got her GED. She also participated in a program that allowed her to share her story through poems—pieces that she eventually shared with her children to help them understand her grief about how much of their lives she’d missed. And she was placed in a substance abuse program, where she was encouraged to continue her journey of self-reflection. “I really had to take a look at the damage I’d done to everyone,” she said.

After getting out of prison on parole, Takata knew she had to make the most of out of her new perspective. She got a job and paired up with the Pu’a Foundation, which helps incarcerated women transitioning back into the community. “I was locked up for 15 years. The transition wasn’t easy,” Takata said. But she eventually got her sea legs. And then, she started looking for opportunities.

Friends encouraged her to go back to school. And at first, she didn’t even entertain the idea. It was too far-fetched. “I’m not good enough for college,” she remembers thinking. “I’m not smart enough and I’m scared.” But her friends and mentors didn’t give up. And before long, she found herself enrolling.

With the help of the Pu’a Foundation, she first enrolled at Kapiolani Community College.

From there, she found her way to Chaminade University. Bro. Dennis Schmitz, of the Marianist Center of Hawaii, happened to work with the Pu’a Foundation and encouraged her to apply. Takata also clinched a Hooulu Scholarship, which covered her tuition and included robust career development and advising resources.

On her first day of classes at Chaminade, Takata couldn’t believe how far she’d come.

“It was like Disneyland to me,” she quipped. “I found myself smiling all day long.”

And while she had plenty of jitters about going back to class, she found no shortage of professors, counselors and peers ready to cheer her on—and give her the help she needed. As an Environmental Studies major, Takata formed a particularly strong bond with Dr. Gail Grabowsky, dean of the School of Natural Sciences and Mathematics and director of the CIFAL Honolulu Center at Chaminade.

In fact, she still keeps in touch with Grabowsky.

“She is absolutely the best professor in the world,” Takata said. “Her classes were hard, but she’s understanding. She helped me realize going back to school was the best thing I ever could have done.”

After a lot of hard work, Takata made it to graduation day—and invited friends to cheer her on.

Now she’s working with women as they leave prison, using her own life as a case study of what’s possible. She’s also ready to jump into the next big challenge. She’s seriously considering the master’s program in Criminal Justice Studies at Chaminade and is also busy growing a cleaning business on the side.

“There’s just so many things I want to do,” she said. “And I’m ready for anything.”

Walking the Walk: Creating a Sustainable Hawaii

April 8, 2022 by University Communications & Marketing

Cara Gutierrez pouring old food onto composting pile

Cara Gutierrez doesn’t just want to learn about leaders in the green movement. She wants to be one.

The senior at Chaminade, who is majoring in Communication with a minor in Environmental Studies, is passionate about helping build a more sustainable Hawaii and has gotten involved in a number of projects on and off campus designed to do just that—from food waste audits to composting.

“I’m just trying to make an impact,” Gutierrez said.

And along the way, she’s hoping to inspire others to do the same.

Gutierrez, who transferred to Chaminade from St. Mary’s College in California as a sophomore, has created a Campus Sustainability Council Club at the university in addition to serving as vice president of the Surfrider Club and a resource recovery specialist at Windward Zero Waste School Hui.

She said her community service efforts grew out of an Environmental Ethics course at Chaminade, where she learned just how important a single person can be in making a positive difference. “I really felt called to help and did different types of volunteering. I wanted to do my part,” she said.

Sustainability Council Club a the beach picking up trash

So she started in her own backyard—by looking at sustainability at Chaminade.

In addition to launching her new club, she also conducted a food waste audit at the university to determine how much is thrown away that could instead be redirected to productive composting. That work led her to connect with the agricultural director at Saint Louis School for an innovative zero-waste project now underway and he in turn connected her with the Windward Zero Waste School Hui.

Gutierrez said she when she first reached out to the hui, which works with five public schools to turn their food waste into composted nutrient-rich soil, the director warned her the work wasn’t glamorous. She would be gathering food waste into huge compost piles, the hui told her, turning and watering them as worms break up the organic materials, and then selling that rich compost to the community.

“She told me, ‘This is really hard work. You’ll have dirt everywhere,’” Gutierrez said.

After working for a day, Gutierrez was hooked. “I said, ‘OK, sign me up!’”

If her volunteering and work with the hui wasn’t enough, Gutierrez is also an intern focused on sustainability projects at Chaminade’s new CIFAL Honolulu Centre, part of the United Nations Institute for Training and Research. She said through CIFAL and her sustainability club, she’s planning an educational Earth Day event and a gathering on Oahu’s North Shore to promote agriculture.

With all the hats she wears, Guteirrez doesn’t have much downtime.

Cara Guiterrez winding a lever on the Golden Rule Peace Boat

But that’s OK. What she has instead, she said, is a community that believes in her—and her mission.

“Climate change is so important and our generation has a responsibility to act. I’m only here for a limited number of years and I want to leave the lightest footprint possible but also have an impact on younger generations,” she said. “Everything I do is for the people who came before and after me.”

She added that her CIFAL Honolulu internship has also helped her zoom out and think about the value of sustainability policy and climate change work at the international level. “In the future, I would be really interested in working toward those bigger goals to make a greater positive difference,” she said.

For now, though, she’s focused on her grassroots work—and on graduation just around the corner. She said she plans to pursue a graduate degree, but will first take a year off to travel. “I’ve learned so much in Hawaii,” she said. “Now I want to go to different communities to learn even more.”

Hokulea Navigator and Environmental Lawyer in Training

September 20, 2021 by University Communications & Marketing

Lucy Lee '23, environmental studies major on Hokulea smiling at camera

Over the summer, Lucy Lee ’23 was one of five student navigators invited on a training expedition of Hokulea and sister voyaging canoe Hikianalia to the Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument.

One of their big challenges: use traditional Polynesian navigation techniques to find Nihoa island.

How tough is that? Lee said Polynesian Voyaging Society President and Master Navigator Nainoa Thompson has compared the task of navigating to Nihoa—with an area of just over a third of a mile—to departing from Hawaii Island’s south shore and finding something about half the size of Diamond Head.

So … pretty tough.

On the day they were set to arrive at Nihoa, Lee had the midnight to 6 a.m. navigation run.

“I was really nervous because we wanted to be at a certain place at sunrise,” the Chaminade Environmental Studies major said. Once Lee conducted some calculations as day broke, she and the other student navigators concluded they were close to where they wanted to be.

They woke Thompson up to share the news and he didn’t say a word. He didn’t have to.

Lucy Lee '23, environmental studies major navigating on Hokulea

“He smiled. We were about a degree and a half off (course)—about as close as you can get without using modern tools,” said Lee, adding that her first deep sea navigation on Hokulea was an awe-inspiring experience. “Papahanaumokuakea is not a place people typically get access to. It’s super special. I think going anywhere by canoe is awesome, and pulling Nihoa out of the water was definitely the highlight.”

While the Papahanaumokuakea voyage was a major milestone for Lee, it’s also only a start. She is training to navigate during Hokulea’s next major voyage: a 41,000-mile trek to circumnavigate the Pacific Ocean, stopping at 46 countries, 345 ports and 100 indigenous territories.

The launch date is tentatively set for summer 2022.

The Pacific Voyaging Society has called the massive expedition, coming on the heels of Hokulea’s worldwide Malama Honua voyage, an opportunity to focus on the vital importance of oceans while developing young crew members, navigators and leaders. Lee said she’s honored to be training as a student navigator, “learning and watching and being taught what it takes to be on the crew.”

“It’s learning how to change lines, how to change knots. But it’s also learning what it means to be a helpful and active crew member,” added Lee, who had only navigated on inter-island and coastal sails before the 10-day voyage to the Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument. “I feel very fortunate to be … learning the skill and the art of traditional Polynesian navigation.”

And she’s balancing all that learning on the water with her studies at Chaminade.

Lucy Lee '23, environmental studies paddling on Hikianalia

“School is really important for me,” said Lee, who graduated from Kamehameha Schools and is interested in going into environmental law. She said she chose Chaminade because she wanted to stay in Hawaii and was interested in a university with an individualized approach to instruction.

Lee said she applied and got into several colleges on the mainland but knew they weren’t a right fit. “You know in all those cliché college movies where they walk into the lecture room and there’s like 200 people?” Lee asked, laughing. “I was like, that’s not for me. I like how Chaminade is small.”

Lee was also interested in an option that wouldn’t break the bank.

At Chaminade, she is receiving the Regents Scholarship (a merit scholarship), which covers about half of her tuition.

And, Lee said, she was looking for an environment-focused program that incorporated policy and advocacy. The Environmental Studies program at Chaminade was perfect. Lee said her ultimate goal is to offer legal expertise and representation to sustenance fishing and farming communities in Hawaii.

“They are ingenious, but they struggle in literacy when it comes to law and defending themselves in justice systems,” she said, pointing to decades-long legal challenges over water rights for small farmers on Maui. Lee added, “I started hearing about that case when I was in elementary school.”

But before heading to law school (and after graduating from Chaminade), she’ll be taking a break.

Because around that time, she plans to be sailing on Hokulea—on its pan-Pacific voyage.

Immersive Experiences Through Summer Institutes

August 13, 2021 by University Communications & Marketing

Dozens of Hawai’i public high school students converged on Chaminade’s campus over the summer for a host of immersive learning opportunities—trying their hand at everything from spoken word poetry to marine conservation to designing a safehouse for a zombie apocalypse.

Chaminade’s Summer Institutes 2021 offerings, part of the University’s ongoing commitment to early college programming, gave rising juniors and seniors at two public high schools the chance to do a deep dive into disciplines of high interest.

The intensive, 10-day courses were free to McKinley and Kaimukī high school students and also included standalone college preparatory sessions on how to pay for higher education, apply for financial aid, select an academic pathway and build leadership skills.

Dr. Janet Davidson, Chaminade Vice Provost for Academic Affairs, said 37 students participated across five Summer Institutes courses. The offerings were made possible in part thanks to a US Department of Education GEAR UP grant.

Davidson said GEAR UP is focused on boosting college attendance among low-income students. To promote that goal, she said, the Summer Institutes program at Chaminade offered participants a high-quality, engaging college-level experience.

“The students had rewarding experiences on our campus—with each other and with their faculty and peer mentors,” Davidson said, adding that enrollees also benefitted from co-curricular sessions with the University’s advising, financial aid and admissions offices.

“Through our Summer Institutes, we aimed to support the academic growth of students, but also provided a series of college readiness sessions. We look forward to growing on our successes this year and provide even more institutes next summer.”

Doing It Yourself: A New World

high school students working together on a business plan project during the business summer institute

Among the available academic sessions was a course—taught by Accounting Professor Aaron Williamson—on entrepreneurship, business modeling and communication skills. “Doing It Yourself: A New World” also included an emphasis on leadership and team building.

Williamson said he wanted the immersion program to give students a “taste of what business really is. At its root, business is the thoughts, dreams and initiatives of a multitude of folks from history to present who simply had an idea and acted on it.”

He added that he was most excited to watch students tap into their passions and personal interests—and then figure out how to direct that energy into a business plan.

“I fully expect to be walking into a few of their establishments one day,” he added.

Word Wizards: The Magic of Poetry and Hip Hop

high school students at the museum of art during a field trip for the english summer institute

English Professor Dr. Allison Paynter drew from English 256 (Poetry and Drama) to design her summer institute course entitled, “Word Wizards: The Magic of Poetry and Hip Hop.” In addition to analyzing hip hop lyrics, traditional poetry and verse-driven dramas, students wrote poetry and then put on spoken word performances.

Paynter, herself a performance poet, said she most enjoyed seeing her student participants collaborate with one another on writing.

“I also loved watching my students perform their original poetry during our Spoken Word event,” she said. “I would like to believe each student felt empowered through the process of writing creative pieces.”

Marine Science Immersion

high school students at the beach looking at marine life during the marine science summer institute

Dr. Gail Grabowsky, dean of the School of Natural Sciences and Mathematics at Chaminade, co-taught a “Marine Science Immersion” summer course with Dr. Lupita Ruiz-Jones, an assistant professor of Environmental Sciences. Students in the session spent the first week exploring the ocean environment from the perspective of a marine scientist and the second considering the impacts of humans on marine ecosystems.

Participants spent time in the classroom, lab and, of course, the ocean.

Ruiz-Jones said students took field trips to Waimea Bay, Sharks Cove, Makapuu, Makaha and Ala Moana Beach. They even took a walk from campus to nearby Pālolo Stream, inspiring three students to return the following weekend for a stream cleanup project.

Grabowsky said a central takeaway of the course for students was just how incredible marine systems are—and how important they are to preserve.

“I wanted them to walk away with a knowledge of the ocean, of course, but also a feeling that college is wonderful and an understanding of how it works,” she said. “I hope they all came away loving Chaminade!”

Psychology Studies

Psychology Associate Professor Dr. Darren Iwamoto led a course in Psychology Studies, challenging students to take a journey of self-discovery and self-awareness to understand the importance of mental health in everyday life.

Iwamoto, who is clinical director of the School Counseling and Undergraduate Psychology programs at Chaminade, said he kicked off the course with two questions: Why do we do what we do? And why do we think what we think?”

It was through those lines of inquiry that Iwamoto encouraged students to consider how they tackle stress, handle change and plan for the future—and how they might apply new and healthier coping strategies in their own lives to promote personal wellbeing.

“It was so memorable to watch so much personal and academic growth in just two weeks,” he said, adding that he also learned so much about his own teaching from the experience.

“I had to learn different strategies of student engagement because I didn’t have grades being the underlying motivator,” he said. “I really like how this Summer Institute flowed and how students experienced psychology versus being told about it.”

Visualizing the Future

high school student working on their zombie apocalypse safehouse during the art and design summer institute

The fifth offering over the summer was called “Visualizing the Future.”

Dr. Junghwa Suh, an associate professor of Arts and Design at Chaminade, led the course—modeled after Art 103 or Visual Design. Students were introduced to the power of visualizations and used problem-solving skills and design tools to create models.

After learning the basics of hands-on modeling tools, Suh set the students to work in groups to create a zombie safehouse—yes, you read that right. Suh said the engaging project required students to think about space planning while trying to figure out how to protect the safehouse’s occupants from a decidedly horrific fate.

“I wanted my students to get a clear and dynamic overview of arts and design, see the connection of arts and design to various disciplines … and use their creativity and logical processing to execute design solutions to given problems,” she said.

Suh added that the students’ final safehouse designs were impressive.

“I hope these creative minds gained some new perspectives in arts and design and understand various possibilities they can pursue with this study,” she said.

And she’s already looking forward to next summer’s courses. “It is so beneficial for students to see how different disciplines come together to solve world problems,” she said. “These types of institutes help high school students in making decisions on what they want to study.”

Under the Sea: Into Challenger Deep

April 12, 2021 by University Communications & Marketing

Nicole Yamase '14 and Victor Vescovo during Challenger Deep expidition — *^{Nicole Yamase and Victor Vescovo}*

Have you ever wondered what secrets can be found at the ocean’s deepest depths?

So has Nicole Yamase ’14. And then she got to travel there.

In March, Yamase was invited to jump into a special submersible and journey 35,856 feet below the waves (or as she likes to say, about 700 coconut trees stacked on top of one another) into the Challenger Deep—the deepest known spot in the ocean, located in the Mariana Trench.

Yamase, who is Micronesian, is the first Pacific Islander ever to make the trip.

She describes the place as nothing less than “unbelievable”—like an alien world.

“Once we slowly got to the bottom, I couldn’t believe my eyes,” she said, adding that the expedition down with ocean explorer Victor Vescovo—who organized the special dive—started about 10 AM. Four hours later, they were there, staring into the murky, dark and deepest known depths of the ocean.

“It looks like a desert down there,” Yamase said.

Reinforcing passion for environmental studies

Yamase, who graduated from Chaminade with a B.S. in Environmental Studies and a B.S. in Biology and is now seeking a doctoral degree in Marine Biology from the University of Hawai‘i, was chosen for the journey because of her deep passion and previous work in helping to advocate for the oceans.

Nicole Yamase '14 (BS Environmental Studies, BS Biology) doing field work

Vescovo, she said, “thought it was time” that someone from the Federated States of Micronesia was invited down to the Challenger Deep, which can be found in their country’s waters. And not just “someone” was chosen, but a young leader who is studying diverse marine ecosystems.

She got additional support for the journey from the Waitt Institute and Micronesia Conversation Trust.

Yamase said the experience of traveling to Challenger Deep was life-changing. It confirmed the incredible love she has for her research—she’s focused on studying the impacts of climate change on indigenous macroalgae important to Pacific reefs. And it underscored her other major academic focus: raising awareness about how climate change and rising sea levels are already impacting the Pacific.

“Humanity needs to improve its relationship with the world’s oceans,” Yamase said.

Because even the Challenger Deep wasn’t free of humanity’s fingerprint. When she was down there, nearly 7 miles below the surface, she saw boating tethers—human trash. “The fact that trash has made it all the way down to the deep is very alarming,” Yamase said. “It’s just a really pressing problem.”

Yamase knows that better than most.

Nicole Yamase '14 being a part of a beach clean up

Climate change is a problem now

When she returns to her hometown of Pohnpei in the Federated States of Micronesia, she sees the rising sea levels lapping up higher than they ever have before. Friends and loved ones post photographs on social media of ocean water going into homes and of cemeteries being washed away.

Climate change isn’t a future problem for her country, she says, it’s a problem now.

And it will take everyone, including her generation and future ones, to fix it.

Opening doors for Pacific Islanders

“Through this expedition, I really just want to promote STEM—because Pacific Islanders, we need us,” Yamase said. “We’re the ones who are going to be in the field. We need local mentors, local role models because that’s what we lack. It really has a huge impact to see your own succeed in the field.”

Nicole Yamase '14 and Dr. Grail Grabowsky — *^{Dr. Gail Grabowsky and Nicole Yamase}*

As she continues to make her mark, Yamase is grateful to her own mentors, including those at Chaminade. She said it was Environmental Science and Studies Dr. Gail Grabowsky, dean of the School of Natural Sciences and Mathematics, who encouraged her as a freshman to apply for a summer internship at UH-Mānoa focused on marine biology. “From that first experience, I was like, ‘oh my goodness, this is for me,’” she said. She continued to be selected for internships and other opportunities, including a chance to study macroalgae in Miami’s Biscayne Bay.

That research formed the basis of the dissertation she’s now working on.

She said Biology Professor Dr. Jolene Cogbill, her adviser in the department, was also hugely instrumental in getting her linked up with opportunities that honed her skills—and bolstered her confidence. “They both really pushed me out of my comfort zone,” she said. “My first year, I never raised my hand. I couldn’t do it. After these summer internships of really participating in these opportunities with other Pacific Islanders, I thought, ‘I’m not alone in this.’”

Nicole Yamase '14 showcasing her research at Chaminade's event in 2012

Yamase said she also got the chance to present her work at conferences and symposia.

She said she hopes to be that same inspiration to other young Pacific Islanders, especially those in environmental science, marine conservation and biology. She said her expedition into the Challenger Deep “was such a great opportunity to show young Pacific Islanders that we can do it.”

“There’s not that many of us in the science fields. Hopefully, this opens up doors.”

Returning Home to Chaminade

March 19, 2021 by University Communications & Marketing

Dr. Lupita Ruiz-Jones, Assistant Professor of Environmental Science at Chaminade University, wants students to plan their careers with intention, so they end up doing work they love.

The key, she says, is pursuing and doing the things you are interested in, even when you don’t know where they will lead. After all, that’s what worked for her.

She was in high school in Santa Fe, New Mexico, when she learned about Chaminade University at a college fair. “I don’t think I ever would have heard of Chaminade except for that booth.”

She wanted to study human impacts on the environment, and she wanted to move away from the desert. Chaminade offered a major in environmental studies, and she was sold.

Seeking out opportunities and going after them has been a life-long pattern for Ruiz-Jones. It’s especially impressive when you learn she was raised by parents who didn’t complete college in a family without the trappings of success.

Her mother was always supportive but struggled with bipolar disorder. Ruiz-Jones’ father went to prison when she was 12, which she says had a significant impact on her. “I really appreciated the ability to choose where I put my attention,” she says.

In one of her first classes, Dr. Gail Grabowsky, now dean of the School of Natural Sciences and Mathematics, told the students it was great they were there. “She told us, ‘You’re going to love what you do, you’ll make an impact, but you’re not going to become rich.’”

“That was fine with me,” says Ruiz-Jones. “I felt like as long as I loved what I did and made an impact, that was what was important to me.”

During her freshman year, she applied and was selected for a five-week summer program in India. “The goal of that trip was to see what small non-profits were doing in India,” she says. “It was really about human well-being and the different ways people were contributing by doing service to the really poor. It was an incredible experience.”

But the summer after her sophomore year at Chaminade, she started doing undergraduate research at Kewalo Marine Lab. That’s where she first got excited about biology and organisms in coral reefs.

Dr. Lupita Ruiz-Jones, professor and alumna

At the end of her summer research at Kewalo Marine Lab, her advisor Dr. Mike Hadfield invited her to continue there in an internship. He also encouraged her to take all the science courses she could, which pushed her into a fifth year of college.

She didn’t mind, though, because she wanted to participate in a Sea Education Association summer-at-sea sailing program that focused on environmental studies. She spent four weeks sailing from Hawai‘i to San Francisco on a tall ship sailboat.

“Wow, that was a really powerful experience,” she says. “We did biological oceanography research. I focused my project on invertebrates that live on the surface out in the middle of the ocean.”

After graduating from Stanford University with her PhD, she received the Thinking Matters Teaching Fellowship and spent four years team-teaching there. That, she says, is where she developed her identity as a teacher and her love for teaching.

During the summers, she started collaborating with scientists at the Hawai‘i Institute of Marine Biology.

That’s how she ended up back at Chaminade, as an assistant professor this time, in Fall 2020.

Right now, she says, her goals are to find ways to integrate her passion for research, coral reef ecology, and restoration into her teaching. And she’d love to take students on field trips to neighbor islands or other Pacific islands. “If we could do something like that where we took students to more remote Pacific Islands for environmental education, that’d be very cool.”